What Does Sound Look Like?

A portfolio by Martin Klimas

Editor’s Note

The German photographer Martin Klimas is known for using high-speed-camera technology to capture processes that might otherwise escape the naked eye. He has fired projectiles into fruits and vegetables and photographed their exploding flesh, and shattered ceramic figures and delicate flowers to capture their thousands of dispersing shards in midair. In recent years, Klimas has devoted himself to exploring visual representations of sound. For his project “SONIC,” he made splatters of paint jump and ΩΩdance on their canvas by playing famous songs from a speaker beneath. For his latest series, “Sound Explosions,” which is currently on display at the Foley Gallery, in Manhattan, Klimas asked a group of musicians to create “patches” of sound using a variety of analog synthesizers, then played the sounds from speakers positioned beneath a scrim covered with powdered pigments. The results: raw sound converted into sunbursts of brilliant color.